Windows XP Surgery

Wednesday, July 16, 2008

Many icons on the new Start panel will help you navigate through Windows in a way you have never done before. All of the icons that are displayed can be customized to fit your needs so that you can have one-click access to several different parts of your computer. Icons such as My Computer, My Music, Network Connections, and many more are now placed right on the Start panel. Windows XP gives you the capability to add even more. Additionally, these icons can be transformed into pop-up menus that expand and show the details. For example, instead of just displaying the My Computer icon, when you move your mouse over the icon, it can pop up a menu that will display shortcuts to each of the separate drives on your computer.

These new features allow you to be much more efficient when working with your computer. You can save yourself a lot of time by enabling the auto-expanding pop-up menu feature on many of the utility icons such as Control Panel. This way, you can have access to all of your Control Panel applets with just one click on the Start Menu.

Windows XP makes it possible to edit most of the navigation icons right from within the user interface so you don’t have to worry about hacking the registry in this section. To get started, follow these steps:

FIGURE 2-4: How to view Start Menu properties by right-clicking the Start button.

Right-click the Start button and select Properties, as shown in Figure 2-4.

You should now see the Taskbar and Start Menu Properties window. Next, click the top Customize button, and the Start Menu settings will load.

The Customize Start Menu is where you can change many aspects of the Start panel; for now, click the Advanced tab. You will learn about some of the items on the General tab in the next few sections.

Once you have the Advanced tab displayed, you will see the Start Menu items scroll box. In this box you will see a list of all of the different features for the icons that can be displayed on the Start panel. Table 2-2 lists in detail all of the different features and their separate options. For demonstration purposes, let’s make the My Computer icon expand automatically to show all of the drives. Scroll down in the box until you see the My Computer title.

Then select the Display as a Menu option, as shown in Figure 2-5, to enable the Auto Expand feature.

Click OK twice, and your change is now complete.

As you can see, making changes to the items on the Start panel is quite simple. Take a look at Table 2-2 for more information on all of the navigation icons that you can customize with the method just described.

Switching to small icons for frequently run apps

The new Start panel includes a neat little feature that will keep track of all of the programs that you run and will place the most frequently run programs directly on the Start panel. I use this list of programs on the Start panel even more often than I use the All Programs pop-up menu because it is just much faster. One way that I like to customize my Start panel is to decrease the size of the icons on the left so that you can fit more icons on the screen. This way, more frequently run programs can be displayed. Figure 2-6 shows the difference between a Start panel that has been switched to use small icons compared to the normal Start panel.

Table 2-2 Start Panel Features

Feature

Description

Control Panel

By default, the Control Panel shortcut is shown and is selected to Display As A Link. I like selecting the Display As A Menu option, because it turns on the auto-expanding menu feature that displays all of the Control Panel applets without even having to open up the Control Panel. Doing so saves me a lot of time and is well worth it. If you do not want the Control Panel to be displayed, just click the Don’t Display This Item option

Help and Support

There’s not a lot that you can do with this one. If you use Help and Support frequently, let this one be; otherwise, uncheck it to free up some space on your Start panel

My Computer

The My Computer icon is one of the best candidates to enable the Display as a Menu feature so that it automatically expands to show you all of your drives. If you do not have any drives on your computer, feel free to disable the My Computer icon by selecting Don’t Display This Item

My Documents

By default, the My Documents shortcut is displayed just as a link. I suggest that you leave this feature set this way if you have a lot of documents in your My Documents folder. Enabling the Display As A Menu option when you have a lot of documents is just not worth it, because it gets so hard to find what you want. If you do not like the My Documents menu on the Start panel, just click the Don’t Display This Item option

My Music

The My Music folder is great, but most of us that have music on our computers have a lot more than just a few songs. I recommend that you leave this one alone as well, because enabling the Display As A Menu feature is counterproductive when you have more than a few songs. If you are like me and do not use the My Music folder, then click the Don’t Display This Item option and you will have made some more room on your Start panel

My Network Places

This is the icon that you can use to browse your local area network if your computer is on any type of local area network (LAN). If you want to connect to a remote computer to view their shared files, you will want to have this option selected. If you do not have a network card, and just use a modem, then I suggest that you uncheck this item because you will never use it

My Pictures

My Pictures is a nice link if you use the My Pictures folder to store your photos. But forget about enabling Display As A Menu on this one. Doing so will just give you a list of file names. With today’s digital cameras’ number schemes, you will never find the photo you want unless you can see a thumbnail. If you don’t use the My Pictures folder, click Don’t Display This Item and the shortcut will be removed

Network Connections

The Network Connections item can be very useful. If you have a dialup connection or even if you have a network adapter and are on a LAN, the network connection shortcut, when set to Display As A Menu, will allow you to easily access all of your connections to view and set properties as well as connect right from the Start panel

Printers and Faxes

No Printer? Uncheck this box

Run Command

I recommend that you leave this box checked, as you will be using this button in various directions throughout this tutorial

Search

Search for files a lot? If not, get rid of this shortcut to save yourself some room

Set Program Access and Defaults

You all probably know about Microsoft’s antitrust problems with the government. Part of their settlement required Microsoft to provide users an easy way to switch between default applications on their computers such as the default Web browser and Mail Client. This shortcut is useful, but it does not deserve to be on your Start panel. Uncheck this box to free up some room. You can access this feature later from within the Add and Remove Programs Control Panel applet

System Administrative Tools

The System Admin tools are the most useful tools besides the Control Panel. I highly recommend that you include this item on your Start panel in both the All Programs menu and the Start Menu by selecting the middle, all-inclusive option

Changing the icons is very easy. You just need to change one setting within the Start Menu properties. To do so, follow these steps:

Move your mouse over the Start button and right-click it with your mouse and then click Properties.

This will bring up the Start Menu Properties menu that you used in the last section. Here, you will want to click the Customize button.

On the General tab, you will see two options under Select An Icon Size For Programs. This is where you can change the icon size. Select Small Icons and then click OK.

Click OK once more and you are finished.

Now you will have made some more room so that you can display more frequently run programs on the Start panel. When you click the Start Menu, you may notice that there aren’t any

FIGURE 2-5: Customizing the Start panel by enabling the Display as a Menu feature for the Computer icon.

more programs showing up. That is because you also have to adjust the number of programs that will appear. The next section will show you how to adjust how many program shortcuts are displayed.

Monday, July 14, 2008

customizing user navigation is the next stop on the Windows XP customizing road trip. In the last chapter, with the help of some cool hacks, you were able to change and improve the boot and logon screens. i will pick up from where 1 left off and will show you how to customize and improve the visual navigation elements of Windows XP.

This part starts off with customizing the look and contents of the cool new Start panel. This new screen can show a lot more than just your recently run programs. If you do not like the new Start panel, you can find out how to get the old classic Start Menu back. Then, you will learn some cool hacks to improve and customize the classic Start Menu. You cannot customize the Start panel and then leave out customizing the program listings. I will show you some cool hacks that will customize this as well.

To finish this chapter up, you’ll learn how to customize the taskbar on the bottom of your screen. The taskbar is a very essential part of navigating your computer. I will show you how to customize and improve its features and will give you some new ideas on how you can use it that may dramatically improve your experiences with Windows XP.

Customizing the Start Panel

The Start panel is what I call the new replacement for the traditional Start Menu that we are all familiar with from using previous versions of Windows. I call this the Start panel because it is not just a menu anymore. It is now a collection of various links and features all thrown onto one panel that pops up. It offers many new features, such as a dynamic list that places your most frequently run programs on the panel so that you can easily access them without having to navigate throughout the entire program listings. Additionally, the Start panel has replaced all of the icons on the desktop except for the Recycle Bin so that your desktop will look much cleaner and uncluttered.

Different tools and hacks are available that will allow you to customize the Start panel. Almost everything on it is customizable. You can add and remove items that are displayed, and you can even change the way it looks. With the many different options available, you can customize the way that different parts of the panel works. For example, you can change the number of frequently run programs that are displayed.

When you have finished reading these next few sections, you will have transformed your Start panel into something that is even more useful for your everyday tasks.

Using Group Policy Editor to customize the Start panel

The Group Policy Editor is a great tool that makes customizing the Start panel a snap. It is a very powerful tool that was not originally designed to be a tool that can customize but a tool for workplace management. Group policies were originally designed so that administrators can limit what a user can do on their computer. Let’s say you are responsible for hundreds of Windows machines at work. Most likely, you will want to limit what users can do on their computers so that they don’t accidentally install a harmful program or change a system setting that renders their computer useless. Group policies make it possible to limit a user’s access to critical areas of the operating system.

The most common use of the Group Policy Editor is to edit policy information on a domain controller. The domain controller can be thought of as a computer on a corporate network that is in charge of security. It is like a database of usernames, passwords, and configuration information. The Group Policy Editor is used by administrators to modify the user configuration data. The next time a user logs onto their computer, new policy information is downloaded and applied. Now the user is limited in what they can do on their computer.

Although the Group Policy Editor is primarily used for computer management in a business, it can also be used to customize an individual computer running Windows XP Professional. Because Microsoft wanted to support both small and large businesses, they have included a copy of the Group Policy Editor with every copy of Windows XP Professional. With that inclusion, even if a company was not large enough to have a domain controller, they could still limit and fine-tune a user’s experience. Unfortunately, Windows XP Home does not come with a copy of the Group Policy Editor. This exclusion was not by accident. Microsoft chose not to include a copy of this utility with XP Home because the Group Policy Editor was designed to be a business utility. And, well, XP Home is meant for use in the home.

Think you can get the Group Policy Editor to work by copying over the program file to a computer running Windows XP Home? Sorry, but I tried doing so, and the program would not start. So, the discussion in this section will only apply to those working with Windows XP Professional. If you are running XP Home, you will not be missing out on too much; the next section about adding and removing the different navigation icons will be compatible with your version.

Now that you know all about the Group Policy Editor, it is time to learn how you can use it to customize the Start panel. The Editor will enable you to enable and disable various different features. First, you’re going to find out how to get the Editor up and running. Then, you can check out a list of all of the relevant features you can use to customize the Start panel.

To begin customizing, follow these steps:

Click the Start Menu and select Run. Then type gpedit.msc into the box and click OK. This will start up the Group Policy Editor. If you get an error, make sure that you have typed the name of the file correctly and that you are running Windows XP Pro.

Now that you have the Group Policy Editor up and running, you will want to navigate to the Start Menu and Taskbar settings. This can be done by expanding the User Configuration, Administrative Templates, and the Start Menu and Taskbar folder.

Once you have navigated through the Editor, you will see a list of all of the different features of the Policy Editor, as shown in Figure 2-1. A number of features listed will only apply to the taskbar. Table 2-1 lists all of the relevant features and provides a description of what they will do. For the sake of demonstrating how to use the Editor, let’s assume that you want to remove the username from appearing on the top of the Start panel. Use your mouse to locate Remove User Name from the Start Menu list. Right-click it and select Properties.

The Remove User Name from the Start Menu Properties window will load. Then, to turn the feature on, just click the circle (known as a radio button) next to Enabled, as shown in Figure 2-2. Then, just click OK and you are finished.

FIGURE 2-1: The Group Policy Editor displaying a list of all of the different features itprovides for customizing the Start panel.

Table 2-1 Group Policy Features to Customize the Start Panel

Feature Name

Description

Add Log Off to Start Menu

If you do not have the Log Off button on your Start panel, this feature will display it when you set it to Enable. Some installations of Windows XP do not have this feature enabled by default. With these, the only way to log off your computer when the button is not displayed is to first click the Shutdown button and then click the Log Off button from the Shutdown menu that pops up. It is much easier and faster to just click the Log Off button in the first place

Remove All Programs list from the Start Menu

This feature will take out the All Programs link that displays the list of all of the applications installed on your computer. This feature is useful if you want to limit the programs someone has access to on your computer, or if you just want to do away with the old menu altogether. Set this feature to Enable and say goodbye to your program list

Remove Logoff on the Start Menu

This feature will remove the Logoff button from the Start panel. If you are one of the lucky users and your installation of Windows XP includes the button to log off, you can enable this feature to get rid of the button, if you have no use for it

Remove pinned programs from the Start Menu

Pinned programs are the list of programs that appear in the top left corner of the Start panel. By default, programs such as Internet Explorer and either Outlook Express or Microsoft Outlook are displayed in this area, which shows the list of frequently run programs. If you would like to remove these links to programs so that you will have more room to display frequently run programs, as shown in Figure 2-3, set this feature to Enable and you are set

Remove user name from Start Menu

You already have experience with this setting from the procedure I walked you through. If you do not want your username to be shown on the top of the Start panel, then enable this feature. This may seem like a useless hack at first, but it may be useful in a variety of cases (such as if you are concerned about the security of your computer). Anyone that clicks your Start button will be shown your username. If you operate an Internet café or manage public computers, you are strongly advised to enable this feature

Prevent changes to Taskbar and Start Menu Settings

Once you get your Start panel and taskbar (see Customizing the Taskbar) looking the way you want, a good way to lock in your changes is to enable this feature

If you want to get your username back, just repeat the above directions but select the Disable Radio Button instead and then click OK.

Table 2-1 shows a list of all of the great features that will help you customize your copy of Windows XP Pro.

Wait to enable the feature that allows you to prevent changes to the taskbar and Start Menu until you have finished reading Part 1 of this book. Otherwise, you may run into unexpected programs as you are customizing various parts of your computer.

FIGURE 2-3: The Start panel with the pinned programs removed from the left side of the panel

Friday, July 11, 2008

The first step in the complete customization of every aspect of your Windows XP is dealt till now. It started from the very beginning with the boot screen and worked through the different logon methods and how to customize each one. Then, it showed you how to make your computer even better by using a few nifty features to make it look and act great.

From now on ill deal with the next part of customizing your computer. First, you will learn all about customizing the new Windows XP Start panel. It show you how to get the most out of this new feature. Then, it will show you how you can revert to the old Start menu style and customize that as well.

After you have customized the heck out of your Start menu, you will be shown many cool ways to customize and improve the taskbar. Changing the makeup of the taskbar and the text of the Start button are a few sample topics from this section.

Till now i was having a cake walk as i have all this part written in advance. From now on it will take a little time for me to post as i need to type the whole thing.

Hope you are enjoying this journey. Stay in touch with me by posting comments.I can help you to in the specific problems you face

If you have a password that has both numbers and letters and you frequently use the number pad to enter in part of your password, this hack is for you. I cannot count the number of times that I started to type in my password and then was faced with a logon error screen telling me that my password was not correct. I would sit there staring at the screen for a second before I realized that my Num Lock on my keyboard was not on.

This is a great hack for every desktop computer with a full-size keyboard with a separate number pad. Turning on the Num Lock by default on a laptop may not be a very good idea, because usually most laptops do not have a separate number pad. Enabling this feature on a laptop will result in almost half of your keyboard to function as the number pad and you would just be much better off using the numbers above the letters.

Start up Registry Editor by clicking the Start menu and selecting Run. Then type regedit in the text box and click OK.

Once Registry Editor loads, navigate through HKEY_USERS, .DEFAULT, Control Panel, and Keyboard.

Next, locate the InitialKeyboardIndicators entry, right-click it, and select Modify. You can enter various codes into this property, but all of them except for the code for Num Lock are pointless. For example, would you want your computer to start up caps-lock, which is code 1? Of course not. To enable Num Lock, you will want to enter 2 into the box.

Then click OK to save the changes, and that’s it!

If you are on a laptop and you attempted to enable Num Lock even though I told you not to and need to fix your system, repeat the above directions but replace the value of InitialKeyboardIndicators to 0 to disable the feature.

If you do not sign on to your computer after a specific amount of time, it will turn on the screensaver. Changing the screensaver and modifying its settings is not as easy as changing the screensaver that is displayed when you are already logged on. You can not change the screensaver of the Logon/Welcome screen from within Display properties as you would normally change a screensaver. The only way to edit these settings is through registry hacks. Follow these steps to change the screensaver as well as the inactivity time before the screensaver is activated:

1.First, you will need to start up the Registry Editor. Click the Start button and select Run. Then type regedit in the box and click OK.

3.First, change the amount of time the system waits after the last activity detected before starting the screensaver. To do this, right-click the ScreenSaveTimeOut entry and select Modify. The amount of time to wait is stored in seconds. By default, the system will wait 600 seconds (10 minutes) before starting up the screensaver. If you want to change this value to something shorter, such as 1 minute, then just enter in a new value, which for one minute would be 60. Next, click OK to save your changes.

4.Next, change the screensaver that is displayed. By default, the boring flat Windows XP logo screensaver is displayed. Try something a little more exciting, such as the 3D flying Windows logo. To change the screensaver that is displayed, you will want to modify the SCRNSAVE.EXE entry. Right-click this entry and select Modify. You will want to change the value of logon.scr to reflect the name of the file for the screensaver that you want to use that is located in the C:\Windows\System32 directory. Because I did not know the name of the file for the 3D Windows XP screensaver, I had to do a search for all of the files on my computer that had a .scr extension by using the search feature in the Start menu and searching for *.scr, as shown in Figure 1-20. The name of the .scr files are usually very descriptive, so you will have no problem finding the right file. If for some reason you do, just double-click each file to launch a preview of the screensaver. After the search, I identified that the file for the 3D Windows screensaver was named 3D Windows XP.scr. One you have the name of the screensaver that you want to use, just replace logon.scr from the value window with the name of the file you want to use, such as 3D Windows XP.scr.

5.Click OK to save your changes, and the next time that your computer boots up, your new screensaver will be shown.

You can also use other screensavers that you have downloaded from the Internet. If the .scr file for the screensaver is not located in the Windows or Windows\System32 directory, you will have to enter in the whole path to the screensaver file instead of just the name.e, so you will have no problem finding the right file. If for some reason you do, just double-click each file to launch a preview of the screensaver.

FIGURE 1-20: Using the search feature of Windows XP to find the filenames of the installed screensavers.

Thursday, July 10, 2008

Every time a user logs into your computer, their username is stored, and that name is displayed the next time the classic logon screen is displayed. This can be a nice feature, but it also can be a feature that causes a security problem. Knowing a user’s username is half the battle of breaking into a computer. If you have sensitive information on your computer, I suggest that you follow these instructions to hide the last user logged on:

Start up the Registry Editor again by clicking the Start menu and selecting Run. Then type regedit in the box and click OK.

Right-click the entry and select Modify. Then type in a 1 to activate the feature, as shown in Figure 1-19. Click OK, and you are finished.

If you ever want to reverse this hack, just repeat the instructions above and replace the 1 with a 0 for the value of DontDisplayLastUserName.

Global logon/Welcome settings

A few hacks can modify the system logon for users of both the Welcome screen and the classic logon interface. These features can improve the quality of the screens, turn on different key locks, and fine-tune other settings such as the screensaver.

Turn on clear type

Users of flat-panel LCD monitors as well as users of laptops can take advantage of a cool new feature in Windows XP called ClearType. This new technology is an advanced version of the font-smoothing technologies that existed in previous Windows versions. When this new font-smoothing technology is turned on, the entire screen will look significantly better.

Normally, this feature is only available after a user logs into the computer, but with the help of a cool registry hack, you can enable this feature to start up before a user logs in. Follow these steps to get started:

FIGURE 1-19: Making the computer clear the last user that logged on using the Registry Editor editing the DontDisplayLastUserName entry.

Start up the Registry Editor by clicking the Start menu and selecting Run. Then type regedit in the box and click OK.

Once Registry Editor starts up, navigate through HKEY_USERS, .DEFAULT, Control Panel, and Desktop.

Locate the ForegroundFlashCount entry and right-click it and select Modify. There are three different options for the value of this property. 0 indicates that font smoothing will be disabled, 1 indicates to use standard font smoothing, and 2 indicates to use ClearType font smoothing.

Replace the value of the property with 2 to enable ClearType and then click OK to save the change.

That’s it—you are finished. You will notice that your logon screen is now much smoother than before. Some users do not like this new smooth look, so if you are one of those that miss the extra-crispy look, repeat the preceding instructions but replace the 2 with a 1 to set it back to the default settings.

Users of CRT monitors (the once-standard cathode ray tube-based monitors) can attempt to use this tweak, but ClearType was designed especially for LCD monitors, so if you are using a CRT monitor, you will not see much improvement, if any. But it doesn’t hurt to try! Working with the screensaver

If you do not sign on to your computer after a specific amount of time, it will turn on the screensaver. Changing the screensaver and modifying its settings is not as easy as changing the screensaver that is displayed when you are already logged on. You can not change the screensaver of the Logon/Welcome screen from within Display properties as you would normally change a screensaver. The only way to edit these settings is through registry hacks. Follow these steps to change the screensaver as well as the inactivity time before the screensaver is activated:

First, you will need to start up the Registry Editor. Click the Start button and select Run. Then type regedit in the box and click OK.

Once the Registry Editor starts up, navigate through HKEY_USERS, .DEFAULT, Control Panel, and Desktop.

First, change the amount of time the system waits after the last activity detected before starting the screensaver. To do this, right-click the ScreenSaveTimeOut entry and select Modify. The amount of time to wait is stored in seconds. By default, the system will wait 600 seconds (10 minutes) before starting up the screensaver. If you want to change this value to something shorter, such as 1 minute, then just enter in a new value, which for one minute would be 60. Next, click OK to save your changes.

Next, change the screensaver that is displayed. By default, the boring flat Windows XP logo screensaver is displayed. Try something a little more exciting, such as the 3D flying Windows logo. To change the screensaver that is displayed, you will want to modify the SCRNSAVE.EXE entry. Right-click this entry and select Modify. You will want to change the value of logon.scr to reflect the name of the file for the screensaver that you want to use that is located in the C:\Windows\System32 directory. Because I did not know the name of the file for the 3D Windows XP screensaver, I had to do a search for all of the files on my computer that had a .scr extension by using the search feature in the Start menu and searching for *.scr, as shown in Figure 1-20. The name of the .scr files are usually very descriptivUsers of CRT monitors (the once-standard cathode ray tube-based monitors) can attempt to use this tweak, but ClearType was designed especially for LCD monitors, so if you are using a CRT monitor, you will not see much improvement, if any. But it doesn’t hurt to try!

LogonStudio is a software app that was developed by Stardock. This application is similar to the BootSkin application, discussed previously, in that it does not modify the system files. Although this method is very simple to use, the Welcome screens must be designed to work with LogonStudio. This is not a big deal, because there are hundreds of Welcome screens that people already made for this program, but users will find that they will not be able to use any of the thousands of Welcome screens made from hacked system files. Depending on what Welcome screen you like, you may or may not be able to use it with this program.

Although you have to give up a little flexibility in the screens that you can use, you will have added safety and ease of use. Because you will not be working with hacked system files, you don’t have to worry about getting the correct version and the possible problems that running an older version could cause. Also, using LogonStudio is very easy. You can change your Welcome screen with just a few clicks.

To get started, you will need to download a copy of LogonStudio at Stardock’s Web site: www.stardock.com/products/logonstudio/download.html. Once you have the app downloaded and installed, most likely you will want to download a cool Welcome screen to use with it. You can download hundreds of Welcome screens from the following sites:

Once you have downloaded a few screens, you can install them by just double-clicking them if they have a .logonxp file extension, which will open them up. If the files that you download do not have a .logonxp file extension and instead just have a .zip file extension, rename the files to .logonxp so that you can easily import them into LogonStudio. LogonStudio will then be started automatically and will display the new Welcome screen in the preview box, as shown in Figure 1-12, when the files are double-clicked.

If for some reason the Welcome screen that you download does not have a .logonxp file extension, and is just a .zip file with a folder containing several bitmap image and configuration files, you can still install the Welcome screen. If you have a Welcome screen that fits that description, then you will just have to manually copy the folder with the Welcome screen files to the LogonStudio folder that is normally located at C:\ProgramFiles\WinCustomize\ LogonStudio.

FIGURE 1-12: LogonStudio showing new Welcome screen installed

When you browse to the LogonStudio folder, you will notice that each Welcome screen has its own folder with the files for the Welcome screen inside. If you ever want to delete a Welcome screen, just delete the folder with the corresponding name.

Changing the Welcome screen with LogonStudio is very easy to do. Just click the name of the screen from the available logons list. A preview will show up in the preview box, and if you like it, click Apply or OK and you are finished.

Depending on your computer setup, you may experience problems when using some Welcome screens with monitors that are set at a large resolution. If you experience a problem like this with a specific Welcome screen, you are out of luck. Try finding a different version of the Welcome screen that was made for higher resolutions. This can be very difficult because resolution data is usually not posted with the Welcome screens.

If you ever want to revert to the original system Welcome screen, just click the Restore Default XP Logon button and it will uninstall the LogonStudio app and prevent it from taking over the Welcome screen. You will also have to do this if you are using LogonStudio to display a Welcome screen and then want to use a hacked system file Welcome screen. First, you will have to start up

LogonStudio and click the Restore Default button, and then you can edit the registry to point to the new Welcome screen. If you do not click the Restore button in LogonStudio, then you will never see your new hacked system file because LogonStudio will still be active and will automatically replace it.

Creating your own Welcome screen from a hacked system file

When users first started to change their Welcome screen, they used the same approach that was used with the boot screens. Resource-hacking tools such as Resource Hacker were used to replace the bitmaps that are stored inside the logonui.exe file. Then, they would adjust the string values within the file with the same tool to change the layout of the screen. Although there are now apps that were built to make Welcome screens easier, I still believe that the best way to create a Welcome screen by hacking your system file is to use Resource Hacker. I have had problems with other tools that attempt to automate the process of hacking the system file resources because the programs will usually only work with one version of the system file. If you have a newer system file than the program was designed to work with, then you won’t see the Welcome screen.

As I stated earlier, the best way to create a Welcome screen from a hacked system file is to do it manually using a cool app called Resource Hacker (www.users.on.net/johnson/ resourcehacker), written by Angus Johnson. This method will allow you the greatest amount of flexibility because you are not limited to the features of a Welcome screen editor.

Although this method is a little complex, it is the best way to create a high-quality and unique Welcome screen.

I am going to show you the basics of how to get started, but I am not going to go into great detail on all of the great things that you can do because there are just too many. Instead, at the end, I will tell you about some great Web sites that I use as references when I want to make a Welcome screen from scratch.

The first step is to make a copy of your logonui.exe file. This file can be found in the System32 directory inside the Windows directory. The exact path is usually C:\WINDOWS\system32. Copy the file to a new folder, maybe your Welcomescreen folder. Also, feel free to rename the file at this time. You can name it anything you want, because when you want to install it, you just have to enter the path and the file name in the registry as you did above when installing a custom hacked system file Welcome screen.

Next, you can start editing the bitmaps in the file. To do this, I recommend using Resource Hacker. You can download a copy of Resource Hacker by visiting www.users.on.net/johnson/resourcehacker. Once you get a copy up and running, open up the logonui file that you just copied. You can do this by clicking the file menu bar item and selecting the file from your drive.

Once the file loads in Resource Hacker, you will see an interface similar to Windows Explorer. You will have four folders: UIFILE, Bitmap, String Table, and Version Info. To get started, expand the Bitmap folder. You will then see several more folders that are numbered. Every numbered folder contains a different image. Expand the numbered folder for a preview of the image that is stored inside it.

Now let’s assume that you want to extract one image out of Resource Hacker so that you can modify it using your favorite paint program and then replace the old image with your modified one. To extract an image, make sure that the image you want is selected and displayed in the preview pane and then click the Actions item from the menu and select Save [Bitmap : XXX : XXXX ], where the X’s are numbers. Once you have an image modified, or if you want to completely replace an existing image, click the Action menu bar item again. Select Replace Bitmap. This will bring up a new screen that will list all of the bitmaps in the file. Click the Open File With New Bitmap button and select the image you want to import. Make sure it is a Windows Bitmap file, as JPEGs and GIFs will not work! Next, scroll through the list, as shown in Figure 1-13, and select the image that you want to replace. Click the Replace button and you are finished.

Once you get all of the bitmap images swapped out with ones you made yourself, you can move on to editing some of the strings in the string table folder. This is where all of the font names and text that appear on the Welcome screen is stored. You can edit the text just like using a text editor. Just be careful that you do not accidentally delete a quote from the ends of the strings. Also, do not change the index numbers or you will run into problems. Once you are finished editing a specific string table, just click the Compile script button and you are finished with the strings.

The next part allows you to be really creative but it also can be really complex. The UIFILE folder stores all of the detailed configuration information for the screen. Items such as transparency levels and font sizes are stored here. When you first view the UIFILE 1033 resource, you may not see anything at all. Just scroll down and you will begin to see the script. Just like the string table, when you are finished editing it, click the Compile Script button.

The last step is to save your changes to the file by clicking the File menu bar item again and just click Save. Now, you can edit the registry to test out your new screen.

It will probably take you a little while to finally get the screen the way you want it. One site that I use as a reference is called Windows XP Logon Screen Secrets, written by Paul Andrews, which is located at webpages.charter.net/joolsie/LogonScreens.htm. This is a great site that will tell you all of the details on how to modify the UIFILE so that you can get the most out of your Welcome screen.

Creating a Welcome screen with LogonStudio

LogonStudio is not only a great program to change your Welcome screen with, but it also is a good program to create it with too. If you do not want to waste a few hours manually perfecting your Welcome screen and do not desire the flexibility the manual approach offers, then using LogonStudio is the app for you.

Creating a Welcome screen with LogonStudio is very simple. Also, you can easily edit welcome screens that you downloaded by clicking the Edit button from within LogonStudio when you have selected a screen. However, some of the screens will not be able to be edited because significant changes have been made to Logon Studio recently that make some of the earlier Welcome screens incompatible with the editor.

To create a new Welcome screen from scratch, follow these steps:

First, if LogonStudio is not already started, start it up from the Start menu’s All Programs menu in the WinCustomize folder. Once it is started, click the New button, as shown in Figure 1-14. This will bring up a new window that will ask you for details on the new Welcome screen, such as the name and the author’s information. Fill it out, and then click the Create button.

Next, the editor will show up and you will see what looks like the default Windows XP Welcome screen. The best way to get started is to just start playing around with different features. When working in the editor, there are two different ways to select an item to work on. You can just click most items, but if you want to get to an item faster, or an item that you cannot click, use the Elements browser. Using the editor is a lot like

FIGURE 1-14: Using LogonStudio to create a new Welcome screen

programming in Microsoft’s Visual Basic. When you click an element, you will see a list of properties appear in the Properties browser.

For example, let’s assume that you want to change the background color. To do this, you can click the blue background, or you can select the Center Panel from the Elements browser. Once the Center Panel is selected, you will see several properties appear in the property browser. The ones that you will be interested in working with to change the background color are Firstcolor and Lastcolor. To change the color, just click the color boxes in the Property browser and select a new color, as shown in Figure 1-15.

Working with images is also very easy with the editor. If you want to set a photo or an image you made as the background for the Welcome screen, you can just select the [Bitmap] property of the picture properties item from the Center Panel element browser. Once you select your bitmap and it is displayed, you may want to change how it is displayed such as if it is a pattern and you want it titled or if you want it stretched across the screen. To do that, just click the Style properties drop-down box and select the style you want.

Replacing the images for the different buttons is also very easy. Just use your mouse to select the image that you want to change, and then one property, called [Bitmap], will appear in the Properties browser. Just click the three dotted icon in the Properties browser. A new dialog box will pop up, giving you the option to edit or browse. If you click Edit, the image will open up in MS Paint for you to edit it. If you already have a new image that you want to use, then just click Browse and select the replacement

FIGURE 1-15: LogonStudio Editor showing how to change the color.

When you are creating graphics for your Welcome screen and want parts of the image to be transparent, such as the background around a button you made, just paint the background with the light pink color (Red: 255, Green: 0, Blue: 255). This is the default color for transparency in Windows.

You will not always want some elements in the Welcome screen. For example, you probably won’t want the dividers that appear in the center of the screen and the dividers at the top and bottom sections. These dividers are just images. One easy way to get rid of them is to click the center divider line to bring up the Dividers property browser, then just click the three dotted icons and uncheck the Use Picture box when the dialog box pops up.

Editing the text of the Welcome screen is just like editing the text in any word processing program. Just click the text, and you will see all of the properties in the Property browser for the font, size, and color. You can even change what the text says by modifying the Caption property.

The area that displays the users account, known as the User Account element, may take the most time to get it looking the way you want. Dozens of different properties are in this area, one of which specifies the location of the user’s accounts on the Welcome screen. This property is called the Account property. It shows a number that signifies a region on the screen. Click the button to the right of the number and you will get a visual map of the different locations. Select a location by clicking it. Another type of property in this section is the Alpha properties, which has three subproperties. These have to do with how visible the accounts are at different stages. 0 is not visible at all and 255 is completely visible. The Alpha Mouse subproperty is used to adjust the Alpha levels when the mouse is hovering over the name block. Alpha Selected is when the user has clicked the name and Alpha Normal is when the name has not been selected and the mouse is not hovering over it. BackColor is the name of another property in the section as well, which sets the background color for the account. When using this part of the editor, I discovered a small bug in the preview window. For some reason, the preview does not show the back color of the user’s account. Instead, it just displays the blue gradation bitmap from the default Welcome screen. Don’t worry too much about this bug, because it is only in the preview screen and will not affect your Welcome screen when it is in use. Once you change the color, the color change is saved, just not displayed.

You now know about all of the different parts of the editor and the basics of how to make a good-looking Welcome screen. Once you are finished, click the Save button (the two disks) and you are finished. If you want to save and view the Welcome screen at the same time, click the Logon menu bar item and select Save and Apply.

You now know the ins and outs of creating your own Welcome screen using LogonStudio. I personally use the method to create and manage my Welcome screens. It is just easier than using the resource hacker and I can live without the added flexibility that the resource hacker provides.

LogonStudio also has a feature that allows you to import hacked system file Welcome screens that you used in the first section on changing the Welcome screen. Although this feature makes it a little easier to convert the Welcome screen to the new format by extracting the images, usually the layout and all of the strings are messed up and require adjustment. If you have a lot of free time, try experimenting with this feature. I have not yet been able to get it to work 100 percent of the time.

Working with the classic logon screen

The classic logon screen, also known as the Windows 2000 style screen, has many benefits over the new Welcome screen for some users. Users that are concerned about the security of their system often do not want a list of all of the user’s accounts to be displayed when they turn on the computer.

In corporate environments, the classic logon screen provides the capability to log into domains (Windows network security servers), although the Welcome screen does not have this capability. Additionally, some people just do not like change that much and they do not like the new welcome screen. Also, if you are a minimalist and like to keep things simple and uncluttered, you may like the classic logon screen better because it is very simple and only takes up a small amount of your screen.

This next section is dedicated to showing you how to turn on the classic logon screen as well as customize it a bit.

Switching to classic logon

The classic logon can always be reached on the Welcome screen by pressing Ctrl Alt Delete two times. If you want to completely get rid of the Welcome screen, doing so is very simple. Before you disable the Welcome screen, you should also be aware that doing so will disable Fast User Switching. Fast User Switching gives you the ability to switch between accounts on your computer without having to log out of one account to log on to another. Most users never use this feature, so having it disabled will not change anything. Follow these steps to kill the new Welcome screen:

Click the Start menu and select Run. Then type nusrmgr.cpl in the box and click OK. This will start up the User Accounts control panel applet.

Once you see the User Accounts app, click Change The Way Users Log On Or Off. Then, uncheck the box next to Use The Welcome Screen, as shown in Figure 1-16, and click Apply Options.

Now, you will no longer see the Welcome screen. If you ever want to use the Welcome screen again, just go back into the User Accounts control panel applet and check the box for the Use The Welcome Screen.

Now that you have the classic logon screen activated, there are a few things that you can do to make it look a little better and unique.

Changing the logon screen background color as well as the visual style and color scheme of the logon screen are all examples of ways you can hack the classic logon screen to make it unique.

Changing the Logon Background

Ever want to change the background color of the classic logon screen from light blue to some new color? Windows makes this difficult, because there are no options anywhere in graphical user interfaces of Windows to change it. However, with the help of the Registry Editor, you can easily change the color of the logon screen. To get started, follow these steps:

First, you will want to start up the Registry Editor by clicking the Start menu and selecting Run. Then type regedit in the box and click OK.

Once the Registry Editor starts up, you will want to expand HKEY_USERS, DEFAULT, Control Panel, and then Colors.

FIGURE 1-16: Disabling the Welcome screen using the User Accounts Control Panel applet.

Once you have expanded the Colors key, you will see all of the different default user settings. These are all of the settings that are used on the logon screen. The entry that you will be interested in is called Background. You will notice that the background entry has a value that contains three different numbers. Each of these numbers represents a different color makeup in the RGB color format. The first number is red, the second is green, and the third is blue. The numbers can range from 0 to 255. A RGB Value of “255 255 255” is white; “0 0 0” is black. Changing the color is not as simple as replacing the numbers with the word red; first you have to convert the color that you want to use to the correct RGB numbers.

An easy way to convert a color to a RGB number value is to use Microsoft Paint, which can be found in the Start menu under Accessories. Once you have Paint up and running, double-click one of the colors in the color palette; this will bring up the Edit Colors window. Next, click the Define Custom Colors button. This will expand the window and will show you the Red, Green, and Blue values for any color you select. Click the boxes in the Basic Colors section to see their RGB values or if you do not see a color you like, use your mouse to click around on the color image to the right to get a custom color. Once you have found a color you like, just write down the number of Red, Green, and Blue. These values can be found in the lower-right corner of the screen.

FIGURE 1-17: Changing the background color of the logon screen with the system Registry Editor

When you have found the color that you want to use as the background and have also converted it to the Red, Green, and Blue format, you are ready to edit the entry. Right click the entry, as shown in Figure 1-17, and select Modify.

In the Edit String box, replace the numbers so that the first number is the number of red, followed by a space. Then, repeat that format for the other two colors so that your entry looks something like this entry for orange, “255 128 0”. Click OK when you are finished to save the change.

Once you change the color, the next time you reboot and the classic logon screen is displayed,you will see your new background color.

If you ever want to revert your computer back to the default blue color, repeat the steps above to change the color and set the value of the background entry to “0 78 152”.

Setting a background image for the logon screen

If you do not want to change the color of the screen, perhaps you have an image that you would like to set as the background to appear behind the logon window. Once again, the only way to set this is to use the Registry Editor to hack the default user settings which are displayed on the logon screen. To get started, follow these steps:

Click the Start menu and select Run. Then type regedit in the box and click OK. This will start up the Registry Editor.

Once the Registry Editor has loaded, you will want to expand HKEY_USERS, DEFAULT, Control Panel, and the Desktop key. Next, you should see all of the different entries for desktop properties. The entries that you will be interested in are Wallpaper and WallpaperStyle.

Right-click the Wallpaper entry and select Modify. Then type in the full path to the image that you want to use on your computer. Let’s assume that you want to set the nice grassy hills photo as your background. This file is located at C:\WINDOWS\Web\ Wallpaper. The name of the file is bliss.bmp. Therefore, the full path of the image file is C:\WINDOWS\Web\Wallpaper\bliss.bmp.

Once you have the path to the file set, you can click the OK button to save the change. Now you can change the WallpaperStyle entry if you want to change how the wall paper will be displayed. You have three different options: 0 centered, 1 tiled, 2 stretched to full screen. If you want to change the way it is displayed, just right-click the WallpaperStyle entry and select Modify, then enter the corresponding number value for the style you want to use. Click OK to save, and you are finished!

Now you have worked with customizing the look of the background, let’s move on to changing the way the sign-in box looks.

Changing the visual style and color scheme

Changing the visual style and color scheme can greatly increase the visual appeal of the classic logon screen. Instead of using the default blue Windows XP style on the screen, you can specify any style that is installed on your computer as well as the different color schemes that some styles have. This hack works great in combination with setting a background image. You can create a nice clean look that still looks good without using the Welcome screen.

To get started, you will be using the Registry Editor again. Also, before you can change the visual style, you should be aware that you will need to apply a patch to your system so that you can run Visual styles that other people have made for Windows XP. More on this will come in future posts, where you will find out where to get Visual styles from and how to install them. Just be aware that you will not be able to change the visual style of the classic logon window until you have read those things. So be patient for that. If you attempt to change it now, on an unpatched system, you will run into problems. However, if you just want to change the color scheme of the default Windows XP style, then you will have no problems right now at all. Now that I have warned you about the possible problems you may encounter, let’s get started:

Click the Start menu and select Run. Then type regedit in the box and click OK.

Once the Registry Editor is open, navigate through HKEY_USERS, .DEFAULT, Software, Microsoft, Windows, CurrentVersion, and ThemeManager. You will now see all of the theme properties for the logon screen. The two entries that you will be working with are ColorName and DllName. ColorName specifies the color scheme of the current visual style that is specified in the DllName property.

First, let’s change the color scheme of the default Windows XP style. You have three different choices for the ColorName value: NormalColor (default blue look), Metallic(silver), Homestead (olive green look). To change this property, just right-click it and select Modify. Then change the value to the corresponding value for the color scheme you want to use, such as Homestead, as shown in Figure 1-18. For example, if you want to use the olive green look on the classic logon screen, you will want to set the ColorName value to Homestead.

FIGURE 1-18: Modifying the color scheme of the default Windows XP visual style with the Once you reboot or log out, you will see the changes that you made.

If you are having display problems after you install a new visual style, make sure that you have properly patched your computer. Remember, you have to patch your computer, not just install a program like Style XP.

important note

Due to need of full html support i am moving the windows xp surgery contents to http://srimank.freehostia.com/. see the library section. This site contains full data and will be updated daily over there. ill also try to post some of the highlights in this blog.

THIS BLOG WOULD BE USED AS FORUM FOR DISCUSSION OF TOPICS IN THAT SITE. READERS CAN POST THEIR ISSUES AND PROBLEMS AS COMMENTS IN THIS BLOG

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